A Slayer's Life
by KatLeePT
Summary: We know Kendra dedicated her life to being the Slayer. We know her Watcher was very strict, not allowing any personal life outside of her Slayer duties. Here's one possible scene as to why.


She stands in death, covered with blood that is hers, her enemies', and those she thought she could love. She stands without a muscle moving, staring blankly ahead, her gaze fixated over all the bodies and dust on the floor. She stands, dark eyes unblinking, uncrying, as her heart whimpers with the echoes of all she's seen and heard this night.

She thought she could love. She thought she could live. She thought the Council was wrong, that she could have a life, family, and love, that just because she was the Slayer didn't mean she had to dedicate every waking moment to her calling and not have what other girls took for granted. She's heard the stories. She's seen the reports. Still, she thought they were wrong. Still, she thought she could have love.

He watches her as she stands as still as a statue. He watches her, and for a moment, he almost leaves her. She chose to run away. She chose to disobey. Watchers have killed their Slayers for less, but not him. The girl has potential, and they need her.

He steps daintily over the fallen bodies, trying not to look at the faces that have been contorted and twisted as their owners died while screaming in horror. He tries not to think of the fact that this is her mother and her father, her brother, and her dearest friends between which he now treads. It doesn't matter what she's lost. What matters is that the world not lose another Slayer, not now when there is soon to be a great darkness on the rise.

He tries, too, not to think of the terrified child he saw in his Slayer's eyes as she witnessed the brutal slaying of the family. He tries not to doubt the Council's ethics in taking this and other children from their families. He reminds himself that they have a calling, they all have a price, and no price is too great to protect the world. If they didn't pay it, the evil would devour everything in its path. Some one had to stop it, and Kendra was that some one.

Besides, if Slayers spent more time with their family, they would surely die just as Kendra's parents have the very night after she found them again. These other young people whose corpses lay scattered around also would have lived, if she'd only listened to him and not tried to be their friend. They could have all lived if she'd followed him and stayed true to her studies and dedication. Their deaths are not his fault or the Council's or even the Vampires'. They are hers.

"Kendra?" She doesn't blink. She doesn't look at him. She doesn't flinch or make any other sign that she's heard him.

He touches the hand that still holds the stake. Blood is pouring from her grip so tight it is. She fought valiantly, but she couldn't save them, just as he'd tried to tell her she couldn't. She herself would be dead if he hadn't intervened at the last moment. In the back of his mind, niggling doubts that he should have intervened faster whisper, urging him to grief, despair, and guilt, but he silences them all. He allowed what happened to happen for the betterment of the world. Now Kendra has no one. Now, at last, she will devote herself to her studies.

"I'm sorry," he says, and that same voice in the back of his mind whispers, _No, you're not. You let them die. Now you have her: your Slayer, your slave._

She drops the stake and blinks at last. Finally, he sees tears begin to shimmer in her eyes. Part of him thinks he should let them fall. Part of him thinks he should hold her as she cries for those she wanted to love and has lost. But he reminds himself she's brought this on herself. None of this would have happened if she had only listened to him. None of these people had to die, but they died because they touched a Slayer's heart, or, at least, tried to.

"I tried to tell you. A Slayer has many things, but she can not let her heart guide her. You must dedicate yourself solely to your studies; all other things distract you from saving lives. If you had listened to me, Kendra, the lives of these victims would not have been placed in jeopardy. If you had stayed true to your studies, we would have seen this uprising coming months ago and stopped it. These deaths are on your conscience. Now, are you ready to listen? Are you ready to learn? Are you ready to be the Slayer you should be, the Slayer you have been called to be, and save others from dying?"

She blinks again, and when she reopens her eyes, the tears are gone. "You are right," she says. "This is my fault."

He smiles thinly, taking comfort in those words. "Are you ready to return to your studies?"

"Yes. But what of . . . ?"

"The Council will dispose accurately of the bodies." They would cover up the tracks, hide the bite marks. By the time they were done, few people would even remember those who had died, and those who did would never know the true reason why. It wouldn't do, after all, for the general populace to believe in Vampires. It would surely cause mass hysteria.

"Come." It is not a request, but a command. If she doesn't come, he will kill her so the next Slayer may be called. It is his duty, and he will always fulfill duty.

Months later, as a certain blonde prattles on about her life, a life she shouldn't have but does, Kendra shakes her head. "All these things," she tries to tell her. "They distract you from your true calling." What she doesn't say is, _You will cause people to die._

But as she comes to know Buffy and her friends, she realizes that, unlike her, Buffy's friends make her stronger. Her family helps her motivation. Even her boyfriend, a Vampire no less, helps her stay alive and keep others alive. She sees it all and doesn't understand, but once she's home again in Jamaica, Kendra lays down and holds Mister Pointy as she thinks of all she saw in America, the land some still consider to be the Land of Opportunity. She wonders why she can't have the blonde girl's life, why all her friends and family had to die, and finally cries, but as the tears fall down her face, hope stirs in her valiant heart that maybe, just maybe, one day she can have a little bit of what Buffy has. Maybe she can have a friend.

The End


End file.
